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Ethylene is important during the berry development and in the last stages of rachis development or rachis senescence. Since grapes develop in a cluster that comprises both the fruit berry and the nonfruit rachis, we measured the release of ethylene from both tissues. Detached berries from Vitis vinifera ‘Ruby Seedless’ and ‘Thompson Seedless’ showed that ethylene release peaks at the beginning of berry development and at veraison. Ethylene production in the rachis was higher than that in the berry and had an obvious peak before harvest in ‘Thompson Seedless’. In both cultivars, ethephon treatment induced ethylene production in the rachis but not in the berry. Expression of 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylate (ACC) synthase (ACS) and ACC oxidase (ACO) genes showed diverse temporal and spatial patterns in ‘Thompson Seedless’ and ‘Ruby Seedless’. For most gene family members, the low ACS expression levels were observed in berry and rachis. Expression levels of most of the ACS and ACO genes did not correlate with ethylene released in the same organ. The transcriptional level of VvACS1 did correlate with ethylene evolution in rachis of ‘Thompson Seedless’ during berry development and storage, which suggested that VvACS1 may have important roles in rachis senescence. In berries of ‘Thompson Seedless’ and ‘Ruby Seedless’, the transcriptional levels of VvACO1, VvACS2, and VvACS6 coincided with ethylene production, indicating possible roles in berry development. Expression of VvACS2–VvACO9 and VvACO1–VvACO3 was not consistent with ethylene production during storage or in response to ethephon treatment, which suggests that the expression of ACS and ACO was affected by other stress factors after harvest.
There are various clubroot pathogen (Plasmodiophora brassicae) resistance genes within Brassica species with european turnip (B. rapa ssp. rapifera) being identified as potentially the best source of resistance for the development of clubroot-resistant cultivars in chinese cabbage (B. rapa ssp. pekinensis). To use clubroot resistance genes effectively, it is necessary to map these genes so that molecular markers inside or closely linked to these resistance genes can be developed. Using molecular marker-assisted selection, the clubroot resistance genes can be effectively transferred from cultivar to cultivar and from species to species. In this report, one clubroot resistance locus was mapped on linkage group A3 using five segregating populations developed from five chinese cabbage cultivars, suggesting that all the five cultivars shared the same clubroot resistance locus. Furthermore, one of these five chinese cabbage cultivars was used to develop a large segregating population to fine-map this clubroot resistance locus to a 187-kilobp chromosomal region. Molecular markers that are closely linked to the mapped clubroot resistance locus have been developed that can be used for marker-assisted selection in chinese cabbage and canola/rapeseed (B. rapa and B. napus) breeding programs.
MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are short noncoding RNAs (20–25 nucleotides) that regulate gene expression posttranscriptionally. However, identification and characterization of miRNAs remain limited for conifer species. In this study, we applied transcriptome-wide miRNAs sequencing to a conifer species Platycladus orientalis, which is highly adaptable to a wide range of environmental adversities, including drought, barren soil, and mild salinity. A total of 17,181,542 raw reads were obtained from the Illumina sequencing platform; 31 conserved and 91 novel miRNAs were identified, and their unique characteristics were further analyzed. Ten randomly selected miRNAs were validated by quantificational real-time polymerase chain reaction. Through miRNA target predictions based on psRNATarget, 2331 unique mRNAs were predicted to be targets of P. orientalis miRNAs that involved in 187 metabolic pathways in KEGG database. These targets included not only important transcription factors (e.g., class III homeodomain leucine zipper targeted by por-miR166d) but also indispensable nontranscriptional factor proteins (i.e., por-miR482a-3p regulated nucleotide-binding site leucine-rich repeat protein). Interestingly, six miRNAs (por-miR16, -miR44, -miR60-5p, -miR69–3p, -miR166b-5p, and -miR395c) were found in adaptation-related pathways (e.g., drought), indicating their possible involved in this species’ stress-tolerance characteristics. The present study provided essential information for understanding the regulatory role of miRNAs in P. orientalis and sheds light on their possible use in tree improvement for stress tolerance.
Hydrogen sulfide (H2S) has been identified as a multifunctional signaling molecule in plants. Here, we show that H2S delayed postharvest senescence of fresh-cut apples (Malus ×pumila) in a dose-dependent manner. Exogenous H2S application maintained significantly higher levels of ascorbic acid, flavonoids, total phenolics, reducing sugars and soluble proteins, and lower levels of free amino acids in apple slices compared with controls. Further investigations showed that H2S significantly reduced the accumulation of superoxide radicals, hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) and malondialdehyde (MDA). Apple fruits fumigated with H2S contained significantly higher activities of ascorbate peroxidase (APX), catalase (CAT), glutathione reductase (GR), guaiacol peroxidase (POD) and superoxide dismutase (SOD), and lower activities of lipoxygenase (LOX), phenylalanine ammonia lyase (PAL), polyphenol oxidase (PPO), and protease relative to controls. H2S also upregulated MdDHAR expression and downregulated the expression of MdLOX2, MdPG1, MdPPO, MdACO1, MdERS1, and MdETR1 in postharvest apple tissue. The present study indicates that H2S was involved in delaying postharvest senescence of apples by acting as an antioxidant and by regulating senescence-related gene expression.
Ten polymorphic microsatellite loci were isolated and characterized from an enriched genomic library of Paphiopedilum concolor (Batem.) Pfitzer. The number of alleles per microsatellite locus ranged from three to 11 with an average of 6.4 in a sample of 30 individuals from three populations. The observed and expected heterozygosity ranged from 0.200 to 0.800 and from 0.544 to 0.827, respectively. These microsatellites can be used as tools to investigate the genetic structure of P. concolor populations and relationship patterns with closely related taxa.